The Night Is Young

Alibi's and Ripped Jeans

Music Is…like sunshine mixed with darkness. Numerous colors of paint on a pallet board. I take my brush and mingle the two colors together. Blues, black, and bits of purple dance with their bright and happy counterparts; orange, yellow and reds in between. Synesthesia, that’s what my old music teacher called it. It’s the sensation of music and color, when you see color you see music.

That’s what music is to me, color. When I sing, no other feeling in the world seems to surpass it. My emotions heighten, the toes on my too big feet curl in pleasure. Colors meld into each other, black dances with yellow, blue with orange and my heart soars. Synesthesia, I like to imagine that I have that condition. It seems like such a hauntingly beautiful thing to have; a curse and a gift all in one. Gladly I would suffer for the sake of art, I would suffer for the sake of music.

Strangely enough that’s what I and Ashley have in common, we love music. As little girls we would create our own songs and perform them in front of our parents. Ashley would always take the lead, and I would be her supporting singer as she belted the songs out. We were terrible at first, out of tune, out of breath, out of our minds. But we loved music, singing, enough to keep going. We held our own practice sessions in the backyard near our fort of long white sheets and high wooden chairs. Even at seven years old she possessed a sense of leadership and confidence that I could only wish for.

“Here, hold this.” She would press a short thick stick into my hand and pick one up for herself. She’d spread her long scrawny legs apart and give me a front toothless grin as she readied herself. Back then mama believed in fat two twist braids, two parted in the front and one long one in the back. That’s how everyone knew we were twins; mama would dress us alike, from head to toe.

I’d hold the stick in my hand and look at it closely. My stick was usually the same as hers, but it would be different in some way. Maybe it would have moss on it, or a little bit or rot while hers would be perfect and beautiful, “Why I always gotta get da bad one?”

She would press one small hand to her hip and scowl, “You always complainin. I got da same stick.”

I would lower my head then and stare at my roughed up Powder Puff Girls sneakers and wait for her to sing. It wouldn’t take long either for her to begin, at first her voice would shake but as she continued it would get stronger with practice. I’d fall in, raise my head and give the song all that I had. Colors swirled, music notes danced and the warm breeze from the summer’s day would urge me along. While she stood in place I would move from side to side as we sang our terribly composed song. Our terribly composed song.

Music; It gives me life, love, and the strength to move forward.

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I Untwist….my two strand braids in front of the bathroom mirror as I hum a tune. Slowly I unravel the hair, starting at the bottom and work my way to the top. Free of their restraint the two strands spring back into a tight curl. They sigh in relief and rest against my scalp. Now my hair looks curly all over; relaxed hair and natural hair appear to be one. The real kinks are happy too, they spiral and stop at the line of demarcation; two inches of pure happy naturalness.

Frank Ocean is embedded within the lyrical portion of my mind; I hear him crooning ‘songs for women.’

The melody of the song captures my entire person; soon I’m tapping away and singing words I unconsciously know. Eyelids flutter, lips move and hips sway to the song as long thing fingers continue to untwist braided hair. That’s me there; happy and smiling as I sing and dance in euphoria.

Anytime somebody asks me if I sing songs to get my women, I say yeah yeah

They say ‘no fear, no fear cuz she here’